UConn Students are a F*cking Embarassment

So last night Meg and I watched the UConn Women's basketball game. It was a pretty big game, they're ranked #1 in the country, and were hosting Louisville (ranked #10) at Gampel Pavilion. This game was nationally televised, ESPN2, hence my ability to actually watch the damn thing.

Now I'm not a huge women's basketball fan, but as a basketball fan in general, I will watch highly ranked women's teams as well as Big East women's teams. And of course UConn (until they are completely blowing someone out).

So last night's game, there were hardly any friggin students there, and Gampel, a puny 10,000 seat arena, was NOT filled to capacity. Only 1 trombone in the Pep Band had face paint on.

WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!!?

I thought college students were supposed to be progressive. I thought they were supposed to be feminists (as in, believing women, and their sports, are equal to men). I thought THEY WERE SUPPOSED TO CARE ABOUT THEIR UNIVERSITY?!?!?!?!?!

It comes down to one thing. It is not "cool" to root for the women's team. It is not "cool" to go to women's basketball games. If you saw the students who were at the game, it would be quite clear that only geeks and nerds give the UConn Women's team the support they deserve.

It makes me sick. UConn has one of the most dominant women's basketball programs in America. The only other program that rivals UConn's is Tennessee. They have one of the greatest basketball players (man or woman) that I've ever seen in Maya Moore. Why are no students going to home games, especially the big home games? Playing home games at Gampel Pavilion should be an advantage.

As someone who works in marketing, I think a big part of it comes down to how the Athletic Department is marketing their product. They need to get edgier and get out into the campus community. They have 2 marketable commodities in Geno Auriemma and Maya Moore. There should be contests for awesome signs made for nationally televised games, there should be a point system for going to the games....students who get a certain number of points get entered in a raffle for tickets/airfare to the Final Four. There should be more thinking of how the hell to sell this team!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

UConn has been great for almost 20 years. That is a long enough period of time for the current generation of students to have been raised into rooting for the women's team. So the other trick is somehow breaking down the idea that women's basketball is inferior, and thus unworthy of our time/support. That is something the NCAA needs to work on, as well as the big time schools like UConn and Tennessee.

Either way, I'm very fucking disappointed in my alma mater. We got a bad ass women's team, almost on par with the greatest women's team of all time (2002 UConn Huskies, 39-0). It's about fucking time some people in CT support this team (outside of senior citizens and lesbians).

Inauguration Weekend: A Running Journal

Sorry everyone that I haven't had a post for a few days. As we all know Barack Obama is going to be sworn in as our 43rd (really 42nd) President tomorrow. Quite a few people that I know are going to the Inauguration, and I've had a busy weekend myself. So I decided to keep a running journal of how I spent my weekend, looking forward to Tuesday and the future of our country. Some or all of these things may be true.....

Friday:

5pm-Finished work. Headed directly to the gym.

7pm-Returned from the gym, immediately began making Chicken Parm for dinner.

830pm-Finished dinner, started playing The Office DVD Board Game. Texted my sister to see if she wanted to come over.

845pm-Made first round of drinks (jack and diet for me, firefly for the ladies)

915pm-Got really pissed at the The Office DVD Board Game for sucking at life. Game had a lot of promise but the videos did not advance (so we got the same questions over and over again). Thanks Frank, you're an asshole!

930pm-Began playing DDR. Made 3rd round of drinks. Talked to Brian "Yes I Was Erect" Coffill for the 1st time.

931pm-Made 4th round of drinks.

932pm-Made 5th round of drinks.

933pm-Did my civic duty by saving the rainforest.

1130pm-Started dance hall karaoke. Had a few more drinks.

1230am-Spoke with Brian "Yes I was Erect" Coffill for the 2nd time. Laid down in front of the fireplace to relax/stop the room from spinning.

130am-Fell asleep to the Sounds of Music. Either the hills were alive or the room was moving a bit.

Saturday:

7am-Trying to save the environment, I respond to not turning down the thermostat last night by turning it all the way down to 60 degrees.

11am-Wake up and in-hale a bowl of Life cereal. Life is really an underated cereal. Despite getting soggy as soon as you add milk, it still is quite good. It is even better when you use Kahlua instead of milk.

12pm-Sat around on the couch until 5pm watching college basketball.

5pm-Showered.

530pm-Bailed out US by paying off the entire national debt.

630pm-Dinner at Taste of Thai in Greensboro. It was ok, not great. Apparently the Pad Thai could have been better. The hot sauce did a great job on my digestive system though! Drank a couple of scorpion bowls. Then drove home on the wrong side of the road.

830pm-Stopped at Harris Teeter to get items for breakfast and baking.

9pm-Baked Oatmeal Raisin cookies as a team. Drank more Jack and Diet.

930pm-Began watching Season 1 of Arrested Development. Drank some more.

1030pm-Booked Meg's vacation.

1031pm-Steph discovered Peaches' vagina.

11pm-Ate some cookies, they are very good dunked in Baileys.....

12am-Went to bed.

3am-Rendevue with the wife

Sunday-

1pm-Woke up. Had breakfast of egg, turkey bacon and english muffin. Made a shitty omlette for my wife. Apparently she didnt like the taste of vodka in her eggs.

3pm-Went for a 4.5 mile run.

315pm-Cooled off by drinking a fifth of Tequila.

4pm-Watched some football, then went grocery shopping.

5pm-At Walmart I paid more than full-price for items to make sure my cashier could afford health insurance.

8pm-Asian appetizer night. Meg made the best and the worst dish. I made two mediocre dishes.

10pm-Began watching the WORST MOVIE EVER. Some chick flick about pants traveling all over, I definitely needed a stiff drink at this point.

12pm-Survived watching the WORST MOVIE EVER. My wife owes me a hour back of my life. Meg, your husband owes me a round of mini golf, where I can beat him like a rented mule (not that I support beating rented mules).

1202am-Started playing the "name the artist" digital music channel game. Starting drinking vodka as quickly as possible. I might as well had an IV.

202am-Went to bed.

Monday:

1030am-Woke up with a phone call from my boss. Though we've all known about the Inauguration for 2 months, Dunkin decided this morning that they want a sampling truck in DC.

1031-After taking a few sips of whiskey, worked out a packing list and product order for work, so that we can sample at the Inauguration.

1230pm-Had breakfast of leftover Chicken Parm.

2pm-Started writing up this blog.

245pm-Finally finished writing up this blog. Went to the gym, stopped at Goodwill to make a large donation of our old stuff.

You wanting a fucking Salary Cap?!

Warning! This is going to be a rant about baseball. Those not inclined to like sports will probably be very bored by this post....

Major League Baseball's owners are getting together to talk about a salary cap. This is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Here are the percentages for total revenues for the major sports that go to salaries:

NFL-59.5%
NBA-57%
MLB-45%

So compared to their brethren in the NFL and the NBA, baseball players are getting the shaft. Do you really think the players will agree to take less of a share of baseball's revenues? No they will ask for more, since that it is only fair.

Teams like the Pirates and Royals claim that they can't compete with the Yankees for premier players. While that is true, their track record of developing their own players is TERRIBLE. When was the last time that the Yankees signed away the best player from either of these teams?! How much of the revenue sharing money are they spending on their own payroll, or on international scouting/free agents? NOT VERY MUCH. The most profitable teams in baseball have been the ones with the lowest payrolls. The Yankees spend what they spend because of the market they play in and because ownership is committed to taking the teams revenues and reinvesting them back in the team. The Steinbrenners, as crazy and despicable as they often are, NEVER care about making a profit with the team. The fundamental goal is winning. If David Glass in KC or whoever the new ownership group in Pittsburgh modeled themselves after Minnesota, Oakland, or even Tampa Bay, they would see that there is a way to be successful without being in a large-market. When you build a good team, fans attend your games, and you make more money to spend on better players.

If you were to institute a salary cap, there would also have to be a floor. There is no way the Players Union would ever agree to a cap without a guarantee that the Marlins couldn't continue to pay $21 million/year. I've seen numbers thrown out there anywhere from $40 million to $95 million. $40 million is ridiculous, because then players would be receiving only 20% of the revenues of the sport. There isn't a workforce in America that would agree to only receive 20% of their industry's revenues. The most reasonable floor has been $70 million. Would the Twins, Royals, Pirates, Marlins, As, Rays be able to pay the bills at $70 million per without revenue sharing or luxury tax money? Criticize the Yankees all you like, but between them, the Tigers, the Mets and Red Sox, they are subsidizing approximately 1/4 of the teams in baseball.

Idiots often claim there is no competitive balance in baseball because of the lack of a salary cap. Because football and basketball have salary caps, they claim there is parity in those leagues. This is MORONIC! In the last 20 years there have been 12 different Super Bowl Champions, and only 6(!) NBA Finals Champions. During that same time period there have been 14 different World Series champs! That is almost half of the 30 teams in MLB. As for those really dumb people who point to how rarely the Royals or Pittsburgh have been good, I give you the Cincinnati Bengals/Arizona Cardinals in the NFL and the LA Clippers/Memphis Grizzlies in the NBA. People talk about how good the Yankees and Red Sox are every year, but there are teams like that in every sport (Patriots, Colts, Lakers, Spurs). Its not that they spend more money, but that they can spread their money between player development and free agency acquisition. If you want to look at the $209 million that the Yankees spent last year, look at how much was dead or wasted money (Carl Pavano $12 million, Jason Giambi $25 million to be a DH, Andy Pettite $16 million to be league average, Hideki Matsui $12 million to be hurt all year).

If teams are smart like the Rays, and lock in their players during their arbitration eligible years, they can under pay their players during their peak years, and miss out on overpaying for over the hill players (something that the Yankees have been doing since their last World Series victory).

So in summary, a salary cap will not bring about more parity. It will not make it so that the Royals have a chance to win every year. As long as they have incompetent management, they will continue to suck. All it will do is put more money in the pockets of the rich owners, take money away from labor (the players), and possibly bankrupt the poorer teams(Pirates, Royals, As). As a Yankee fan, it is easy to be anti-cap. BUT I have no problem with them paying a luxury tax, so long as the other teams use it to help pay for players on the field. If they are using the Yankees as an ATM, that's where I have an issue (and quite a few of them have done that). The teams complaining about how much money they spent this winter should realize that if the Yankees did not spend, the size of the checks that they would get from the Yankees would go down DRAMATICALLY. Thus reducing their ability to have a healthy bottom line, or spend that on better players themselves.

Hey Russia, the Cold War is supposed to be over!

20 years after the official end of the Cold War, Russia is still an asshole. There was real hope that they had democracy and were embracing our form of capitalism. But over the past 5 years they have shown repeatedly that they haven't changed all that much, besides controlling a hell of a lot less land.

The current problem is that they are one of the primary providers of natural gas to Europe, especially Eastern Europe. But their "state run monopoly" Gasprom had turned off the spigots. They claim that Ukraine is stealing gas from the pipeline that goes through their territory. In order to force Ukraine to pay up, they stopped sending any gas at all. The problem with this is that it fucks Europe. It is below freezing and they can't get enough gas to heat their homes.

This is a classic example of shitting where you eat. Now Europe is making an all out search to get their energy from someone other than Russia. They will go to Greece and the Middle East pipelines over Russia. Though they have enormous amounts of gas reserves, Russia is in the process of making itself the country that everyone avoids. Unless countries get real desperate, all of that energy revenue rolling into Russia is going to dry up.

Ukraine claims that they never took any gas, and that Russia is trying to punish them for trying to join the European Union and NATO, and generally embracing Western ideas. I have no idea if this is true or not, but it would be consistent with their current attitudes/actions globally.

As it is, Russia has no problem with Iran having nukes, North Korea having nukes, and anyone else that is an enemy of the West having nukes. They don't even know where all of their nukes are! There were international incidents of poisoning critics of the government, censoring newspapers and television, Chechnyan violence, and basically the election of Putin as leader for as long as he feels like. Last time I checked, in democracies the leader doesn't stay in power indefinitely. This doesn't seem like a new Russia. It is very much the same thing, just with a capitalist twist (so that they can rake in the profits from Gasprom).

It is hard for me to blame the Russian government for being anti-Western, as the Bush administration has done everything it can to alienate as many countries as possible. But at the same time, we're the country that is most involved on a global level. We're rapidly descending from super-power status (which I think is a good thing. Time for the rest of the world to ask China to help clean up their messes, not just us.) and therefore, we don't control the Western world like we once did. Anti-Western means more than anti-U.S. at this point, and it seems like Russia is stuck in 1960s-70s thinking. So let them keep killing off critics of their government, let them keep shitting where they eat, let's see them keep fucking with the Western world, and let's see what type of shithole country they end up with.

Mass Hysteria!

Everybody panic! Quick, stock up on bottled water and canned meat! Head to your basement if you have one, or your downstairs bathroom if you live in the South! (we don't have basements down here, no frost line....)

Ok, now that I have your attention, I was doing my best to mock the mainstream media and the government. We are in a recession. Of this I am aware. I think everyone knows this, if not, well, I'd like some of what your tokin. How did we, as a country, get to this point? People living beyond their means, spending money on shit that they can't afford, and may never afford. My friend Mike is a landlord up in CT. He has to evict people from the North End of Hartford, people who have BMWs. They would rather spend the money that they have on a flashy car than pay rent or live in a decent apartment. They drive nicer cars than Mike, who owns multiple buildings (and this is his side job)!

As long as you could afford the monthly payment on an item, whether it be a car, a house, a tv, a credit card, a yacht, you were good to go. When Steph and I were approved for a mortgage, we were approved for up to $280k with ZERO down. That is batshit insane! I like to say that we are a 1.5 income family (and even that may be generous). There is no frickin way I could pay a mortgage for something like that. I have made my share of financial mistakes over the years, but this would be financial suicide, and the mortgage company had no problem mixing the koolade for me.

The end result of all of this money-spending madness has been record foreclosures, the near collapse of the financial sector, and company after company laying people off. In response to all of the gloom and doom, it finally appears that most of society is coming to their senses. We are all saving more money, spending only when we need to. The retail stores got demolished this holiday season, because we all decided to spend less and more thoughtfully. I know I didn't pay full price for any holiday gift that I purchased. The deals were unreal. If things keep up this way, I can't see all of these retail stores staying open.

But isn't all of this new found financial responsibility a good thing? Yes, quite a few retail chains and large companies may go under, many good people will lose jobs (and that may be easy for me to say, but I'm not so arrogant as to think that I couldn't be one of those people), and families across the country will have to tighten their belts. If the end result is a culture of people only spending what they can afford, people saving money to get them through hard times, people investing in higher/advanced education, and generally investing more responsibly, wouldn't that make the US a stronger country, more ready to succeed in the 21st century? I believe this would be a case of taking 1 step back to take 2 steps forward. Economists write books about how parents should teach their children to save money, spend what they can afford, and avoid credit card debt. So it is about time we all finally did what all these smart people reccommend.

And now that we're all FINALLY doing all this, the mainstream media is freaking out. Talking about deflation. In typical fashion, they continue to focus on all of the negative. I know there is a ton of negative news, and that it is all news we need to know. At the same time, maybe they should bring up some of the positive. There has been a lot of flab added to the American economy. Companies have over-expanded and need to trim down. We're all going to the gym now and slimming down. No pain, no gain. New year, new you. So they should also talk about how this could help the country in the long run. They should mention how families and businesses can save money, prepare better for the future, and make more responsible financial decisions. Fostering mass hysteria just causes everyone to freeze up, panic, and hide away in the basement.

Don't Trust Your Waitstaff!

Waitstaff. They cannot be trusted.

Ok, so that is kind of a crazy thought. Just last night I went to Friendly's with my wife's family, and our waitress Natasha, was AWESOME. She dealt with a family that could be politely called difficult, and made sure that everyone walked away happy. But she is the exception to the rule. Well her and my girl Stacey from Toronto, but that is another story!

Let me set a scene for you. New Year's Eve 2008. A beautiful club, nice people, nice tunes, seemingly nice waitstaff. But that's where everything went wrong. The bar staff started the evening by pouring DUBRA for the cosmos and vodka crans. Not exactly the top shelf that I thought we were paying for (in fairness they did have absolut and skyy, you just had to specifically request them). A little sneaky, none the less.

Next, the waitstaff began to pass out warm appetizers. If you were unfortunate enough to be sitting at what we jokingly called "the Kids Table", then you had to flag the waitstaff down to get any of these delicious tidbits. Twice I was the only person at the table not to receive an appetizer (I missed out on the delectable pigs in a blanket and fried calamari), as the waitstaff only had enough for 9, not 10. In general our table missed out on many really awesome looking appetizers due to age-discrimination by the waitstaff.

Finally, I had been one of the designated photographers. Obviously nobody wanted to memorialize my super amazing dance skills. In my drunken haze, I decided that it would be fine to put down the camera on the table with people's wallets, I-Phones, LG Dares, Blackberrys, money belts, purses, and gold bars. I didn't think twice about a little pink camera (it really matched my shirt). So I added the camera to the pile of expensive goodies and went to get my groove on to some Journey. At the end of the night, we all collected our belongings, but the little fucking camera was gone. Not the wallets, I-Phones, LG Dares, Blackberrys, money belts, purses and gold bars. All of those were still there. I was flummoxed. So we began looking under tables, in ceiling tiles, in my pants, everywhere. It was gone. We asked the bartenders (but they were busy pouring Dubra into Absolut bottles). We asked the waitstaff (they were busy running for doors). We would have asked the other guests, but they had long since gone home (it was similar to Jack and John's wedding in that regard, minus my helping load someone's car, that I hope was a relative's, with gifts). So I asked our waitress point blank, did she know where it was. Suddenly, she could barely speak English, it was all Polish (really, I'm not making that up, one of the friends I made that night was Polish and he told me that was her native language). I figured we weren't going to get anywhere with her, so we gave our contact info to the bartenders (I guess they were in charge) and left in a huff.

So what did we learn here? Not much. If I were waitress I might have taken the I-Phone, or maybe the money belt. Not a crappy camera (no offense to the owner of the camera, which wasn't me). Just be careful, and make sure to give all of your waitstaff full body cavity searches before you leave for the evening. And maybe keep that stupid little camera in your pocket.....

Israel and Gaza

Ok so where to begin....
We could go back thousands of years. The people of Israel and the people of Palestine have been butting heads for quite a while now. The current crisis, in my super advanced opinion, has the potential to start WWIII. Yes, that does sound severe. But basically both sides are in a glorified pissing contest. Both groups of people feel that they have the right to control certain lands, and both groups feel that they are justified using violence to obtain that control.

Violence begets violence. The way I look at it, Palestine is less advanced nation that can't be expected to have complete control of its people. Israel is a modern nation, with a world class military and even a system of laws. The extremists among the Palestinians are terrorists. They lack the mental development to understand that bombing the advanced world will not improve their conditions in life, nor that of their children. These terrorists have, in general, lived lives that are far harder than anything we can imagine. I shouldn't judge them on most of their views, but their complete disregard for human life is unfathomable. The people in charge in Palestine can't stop these extremists. To hold them responsible for the extremists would be like holding the state of South Carolina responsible for the actions of the KKK. But for some reason, Israel doesn't get this. Every so often, they get tired of getting attacked and strike back in Gaza or the West Bank.

I don't blame Israel for being pissed at the terrorists. If I had my family and friends killed by bombs lobbed by moronic assholes, I would want blood. BUT countries are supposed to act better and bigger than human beings. They are not supposed to lash out just because they are angry. Governments (at least democracies) are put in place to take care of major issues (like terrorist attacks) in a way that is more advanced than 2 kids fighting in the playground. Israel needs to be the bigger person and try harder to work with the Palestinian leaders to reign in the terrorists. Israel needs to WORK WITH the Palestinians to bring peace to their region. Bringing more bloodshed to the region does nothing but alienate the Islamic world, while recruiting more angry extremist soldiers among the Palestinians.

Just as Israelis deserve a country of their own, the Palestinians do too. I think it is time for Israel to realize this and act like a more civilized nation. If they keep using the GW Bush playbook for foreign policy, the US and the rest of the world will soon be dragged into a very nasty quagmire. So Israel and Palestine, get your shit together and start valuing human lives!